There were men rough, coarse, brutal,
murderous; but against them were other men self-reliant, stern,
just, and resolved upon fair play.
That was indeed the touchstone of the entire civilization which
followed upon the heels of these scenes of violence. It was fair
play which really animated the great Montana Vigilante movement
and which eventually cleaned up the merciless gang of Henry
Plummer and his associates. The centers of civilization were far
removed. The courts were powerless. In some cases even the
machinery of the law was in the hands of these ruffians. But so
violent were their deeds, so brutal, so murderous, so unfair,
that slowly the indignation of the good men arose to the
white-hot point of open resentment and of swift retribution. What
the good men of the frontier loved most of all was justice. They
now enforced justice in the only way left open to them. They did
this as California earlier had done; and they did it so well that
there was small need to repeat the lesson.
The actual extermination of the Henry Plummer band occurred
rather promptly when the Vigilantes once got under way.
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